Album Review: Best Coast- Fade Away
By the time Fade Away
hits the streets, I think we're going to need a #pray4bethany trend on Twitter.
It didn't really strike me until I looked at all the song
names, listed out in order, but Best Coast’s new EP…excuse me “mini-album,”
doesn't so much read like something as drastic as a suicide note, but it is
most definitely a loud cry for attention; possibly a cry for help.
Bethany Cosentino made a career in the summer of 2010 by
rhyming “crazy” with “lazy” and writing songs that were mostly about, but not
limited to: smoking pot, California, boys, her cat, being crazy, being lazy,
et. al. Her debut full length, the aptly titled Crazy For You was a sloppy fun blend of girl group vocals and
garage rock lo-fi production.
But sometimes, when you’re crazy and lazy, maybe you want to
grow up, and you don’t want to sit around missing a boy you are also mad at,
wanting your cat to talk, or smoking copious amounts of weed. Cosentino grew up
fast—maybe a little too fast—with 2012’s career killer The Only Place—a record that was kind of about the same things, but
also about being entirely too self-aware of yourself as an artist. Produced by
Jon Brion, it sounded like it cost mad bank to make. Brion, best known for his
mainstream work with the likes of Fiona Apple, Beck, Elliott Smith (RIP), and Late Registration by Kanye West, pretty
much removed any shred of reverb, creating a clean and crisp and very un-Best
Coast sound.
As a musician, changing your game up at some point is
probably a good idea. But maybe not on your second album. And maybe not in so
much of a drastic way that it leaves heads scratching and alienates a ton of
your listeners.
Fade Away isn’t so
much a step back for Cosentino, but it’s the step she should have chosen last
year. Stripping away some of the big money production values, and bringing back
some traces of her garage rock aesthetic, Fade
Away was produced by Wally Gagel, who is able to find a balance between the
two sounds of the band.
Cosentino’s personal life comes spilling out into many of
the lyrics on Fade Away—she famously
dated “Wavves,” for a few years. “Wavves” being of course the name for the
stoner/surf rock project of Nathan Williams. But her and Williams are long
over, and according to my younger, hipper friends, Cosentino drinks too much
now, and apparently just spends all of her time feeling sorry for herself, and
wanting everyone else around her to feel just as bad.
Fade Away is not a
revelation. It’s also not horrible. It’s many things—it’s a quarter-life crisis
set to music; it’s a breakup record; it’s a pity party you should RSVP to
right away; and as mentioned earlier, it’s a bit of a plea for help.
There are seven songs on this release, and here is how the
track list looks—
This Lonely Morning
I Wanna Know
Who Have I Become
Fear of My Identity
Fade Away
Baby, I’m Crying
I Don’t Know How
Needless to say, we should begin to #pray4bethany right
away.
In the press materials for Fade Away, Cosentino explains that it was inspired by Patsy Cline,
Mazzy Star, My Bloody Valentine, and the sleep aid Ambien. I can hear almost
all of those things. Sure there is some guitar distortion. But come on—My
Bloody Valentine is a stretch.
As a whole, from start to finish, Fade Away is surprisingly listenable. There are super fast songs
that harken back to the early days of Best Coast—opener “This Lonely Morning”
is a fantastic example of that. Both “I Wanna Know” and “Who Have I Become” are
both just a tad too derivative of the whole “girl group” thing—right down to
the handclaps and sing-a-long refrains.
Cosentino hasn’t grown a ton as a lyricist—“The nights are
getting longer/The pain is getting stronger,” she coos on “Fear of My
Identity,” one of two songs featured that were released in April as a Record
Store Day exclusive 7” single. As Fade
Away continues on, the songs get bigger in their sound and intention—“Fade
Away” is just fucking huge—huge like a Green Day power-pop anthem.
As Fade Away comes
to an end, “Baby, I’m Crying” is pretty much a page ripped directly from the
Mazzy Star playbook, maybe with a few more pop hooks applied to it. And when
compared to Mazzy Star’s comeback LP—this song is actually the best Mazzy Star
song you’re going to hear in 2013.
The EP’s closing track is the country tinged “I Don’t Know
How.” It begins like a modern take on Patsy Cline (see those influences) but
quickly flies off the rails at roughly the halfway point. Picking up the tempo
and growing slightly manic, the unexpected addition of the girl group stylings was
initially very off-putting when this song was released in advance. For some
reason, however, within the context of the rest of the record, it makes sense,
and the more I listen to it, the less of a bother it has become.
It seems like within the last minute and change of the song,
it kind of all “comes down to this.” She’s played all of her cards, and
continues to do so. She’s tired of being the “crazy/lazy” girl, wants to grow
up, is afraid of growing up, and so she backslides right into the comfortable
caricature she’s drawn herself to be. “I don’t know how,” she sings, and it
seems like the whole thing runs deeper than maybe she even intended—or maybe
I'm just reading way too much into a Best Coast song.
Fade Away grows on
you. Like I am genuinely shocked by how much it has grown on me. Had this
come in between her full-length releases, the sudden interest in a sound
maturation wouldn't have been such a jolt, or has sounded like such a train wreck.
As much of a downer as this EP is, it’s also a little bit of a sign of hope
that Cosentino can get a little better handle of her band’s direction in the
future.
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